Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Tuesday 27th March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I should like to congratulate the Government and also to express my very deep gratitude to the Ministers in this House and in the other House for achieving a very sensible solution. I am also particularly grateful to the government lawyers who have done an enormous amount of work both for me and for those behind me, and who took the trouble to deal directly with the former chairman of the Family Law Bar Association and the chairman of the ILPA in relation to a later amendment. I really am very grateful.

However, I have a wish list—I might refer to it when the first government amendment that was accepted today enables a little more money to be provided—for two groups of left-behind parents. They are generally fathers, but sometimes they are mothers. The first situation concerns preventing a threatened abduction in a family where both parents are still living together because neither parent has yet applied for a court order. The left-behind parent may be warned by another member of the family that the mother, generally, will take off with the child and that the father will never see the child again. That would require a prohibited steps order. I understand the thinking of the Government on why they will not deal with the matter now. However, I would like them to put it on the waiting list because it needs to be done at some stage.

The second is where the mother—it is generally the mother, but sometimes the father—removes a child in a situation where there is not yet a residence or other order. That internal parental abduction case is not covered, either. I would like to put both those matters on the wish list and I hope that one of these days the Government will be sympathetic to them. However, the work that has been done, and the recognition by the Government that this should be dealt with, is splendid news, and we are all extremely grateful.

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, it is only a few weeks since the noble Lord, Lord McNally, described Lord Newton as a national treasure except when he voted against the Government. I intervened somewhat mischievously to say that that was what made him a national treasure. In fact, of course, he was a national treasure for a long time before that. I have good memories of working with him when he was a very approachable Minister and I was the leader of my local authority. I also had the pleasure of serving under him as a member of the Local Services Honours Committee, which he chaired with great care, always exhibiting great thoughtfulness and fairness. He was a man of great conviction and great courage, as he demonstrated fully in your Lordships' House for so many months. We will all miss him, as other noble Lords rightly said.

I turn to the amendments in this group and join the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, in acknowledging that the Government have made significant improvements to the Bill and in congratulating the noble and learned Lord on doing that. I also congratulate the noble and learned Baroness on initiating these very welcome changes. I endorse what she said about further developments. Now, of course, the Government have the capacity to bring them about without primary legislation. The Opposition look forward to that in due course and certainly support the amendments in this group.

Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Wednesday 7th March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, there are three amendments here that relate to internal child abduction. Noble Lords may well know that international child abduction is governed by the Hague convention, to which the United Kingdom is a signatory. There is a well established procedure for dealing with a child wrongfully removed from any part of the UK to a foreign country. There are emergency hearings before a High Court judge and the attempt at recovery process then takes over. That process is well known and well established.

There is no such procedure for internal child abduction within the UK, although we operate three separate legal processes in the three jurisdictions of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. A child may be taken wrongfully from Exeter to Belfast, Glasgow or even Carlisle, which may be just as upsetting or traumatic as abduction to France or Sweden. Removal from home, school, friends and security, and fleeing with a parent who is often acting irresponsibly and removing the child wrongfully, is certainly not in the best interests of the child. It is also traumatic for the left-behind parent, who has no idea what happened to the child or even whether he or she will ever see that child again. The decision for a child’s future should be made sensibly and responsibly.

Where there are two parents, each with parental responsibility, one parent cannot up and go with the child to live elsewhere without the consent of the other parent—I do not think that all parents know that—and even more so when the parents are separated and one parent has a residence or custody order. Under the Bill’s proposals, though, there is no provision for legal aid for the left-behind parent to find out where the child has gone, whether the child is safe and how to put into effect a process similar to that employed if the child has gone abroad. Quite simply, I am asking that there should be exactly the same process internally within the United Kingdom as there is externally for abduction to a foreign country.

I am extremely grateful to the Lord Chancellor, who asked to see me on this issue, and to the Minister for seeing the noble Baroness, Lady Shackleton, and the chairman of the Family Law Bar Association. As I understand it, the Government recognise the problem and that it requires a solution. I suspect that the only issue between us is how far they will go, because there are two aspects to the issue of internal child abduction: one is the recovery of the child but the other is the prevention of the removal of the child. Consequently, one needs both the prohibited steps order or a specific issue order and the location order, sometimes called “seek and find”, or a recovery order involving the tipstaff and the police—the police will not act unless there is an order—asking various agencies for addresses and going through the well known process that happens internationally but not nationally.

There is no reason why the international system should not apply internally, and I understand that the Government accept that. It is important that the whole process should be applied. I make it clear that it is intended only to stop the child being removed, to get the child back or at least to know that they are safe and properly cared for. It is not intended to be a backdoor entry into private-law family cases. Everyone understands that in a situation in which it is known where the child is—perhaps a social worker in the area finds the child with grandparents and says that the child is perfectly safe—the legal aid will drop at that moment. It would be the responsibility of the left-behind parent or the parent who has wrongfully removed the child to go to court. They would then be on their own, like any other couple in dispute over their children.

The process for which I seek legal aid is purely and simply connected to potential or actual abduction. I repeat without apology that I am asking for the process for abduction throughout the United Kingdom to be exactly as the same as the international process under the Hague convention. I beg to move.

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, this amendment gives me a sense of déjà vu. More than 30 years ago, I acted for a father whose three children were in effect abducted by his wife and removed to Scandinavia in flagrant breach of undertakings and a court order. The case was tried by a Mr Justice Faulks. I do not know whether he was any relation of the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, who is not now in his place. It was a tragic case; the father lost virtually all contact with his two daughters, although his son eventually returned of his own volition. It exemplifies the kind of family tragedy that can occur when one party flouts all legal responsibilities.

I congratulate the noble and learned Baroness on bringing these amendments forward. Since there is a sympathetic reaction from the Government, I hope that the Minister will undertake to bring this back at Third Reading to resolve the matter satisfactorily. It seems axiomatic that the same procedure should, as the noble and learned Baroness suggests, apply whether the abduction is outside the jurisdiction of the UK courts or within one of the three jurisdictions that obtain. It looks as though the Government are minded to accede to that. I very much hope that an indication can be given that this will be resolved at Third Reading.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, I congratulated the noble Lord on moving this important amendment in Committee, where he raised a particularly moving case. I congratulate him on raising the matter again on Report. I hope that the Minister will produce a satisfactory answer.

In Committee I raised a different point—perhaps not as clearly as I might have done—based on advice that MIND provides for patients. The point was not in relation to treatment for a mental health disorder, which of course would be covered by the Mental Health Acts and which the noble Lord, Lord McNally, pointed out would remain within scope. However, there may be a question regarding someone who suffers from a mental health disorder but whose treatment is for a physical problem, not for that disorder. The MIND briefing to patients states:

“Specifically, the laws in Part IV of the MHA on treating people without consent, only apply to treatment for mental disorder. They do not apply to the treatment of physical disorders unless it can reasonably be said that the physical disorder is a symptom or underlying cause of a mental disorder”.

A situation may be arising there in which the provision of legal advice would not be within scope because it is not for treating the mental health disorder.

I appreciate that an off-the-cuff answer might not be immediately available on that point, and I may have got it entirely wrong. However, such a situation strikes me as a possibility emerging from this briefing. So while I would certainly encourage the Minister to endorse the amendment of his noble friend, I would also ask him to undertake to look at the point that I have raised and, if necessary, to bring something back at Third Reading.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I supported the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, in Committee, and I do so again now. As I said then, I had experience, at one time, of trying the majority of permanent vegetative state cases. I fear that there will be a small number of cases that are extraordinarily difficult to decide, where the families are placed in an agonising position. They really ought to have the opportunity to be heard in the court and to deal with this matter. Such cases are rare but very important. I very much support the proposal that something should be done about this.

Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Monday 30th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham]

I absolutely agree with everything that the noble Lord has just said. This is a fundamental change in the way in which litigation is to be conducted. It should not just be referred to a wholly unaccountable, although no doubt extremely worthy, group of people on the rules committee. Obviously, they are very eminent but they are not accountable, in the sense that the normal framework would be, to approve changes of this significance. Perhaps, as he develops his reply, he would deal with the point of restricting this significant change to personal injury cases when Lord Justice Jackson advocated it across the piece. Perhaps he would care also to reflect on a point made when colleagues and I met the Association of British Insurers no less, which, for example, said that it did not support means testing for qualified costs shifting at all. But, as I understand it, that is to be part of the scheme—if that is what presumably the rules committee, since it will not be part of the Bill, will say.

The noble Lord is absolutely right to raise these issues and I hope that the Minister will take this back and think again about how matters are to be progressed given the significance of the change.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

Perhaps the Minister will not mind if I add a very few words. I had not intended to intervene but, as a former chairman of a rules committee, I have to say that I have considerable faith in the good sense of the way in which it does its work. But the points that have been made are extremely relevant. It is not really the business of a rules committee to change something so dramatic. As the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, has said, I would add that “unreasonable” is extremely difficult. The words used by the noble Lord are the standard words that have been used from time immemorial, as the lawyers say. “Unreasonable” is nothing like as serious as the other term but is liable to cause considerable difficulties of interpretation.

Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Wednesday 18th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I support this amendment. I declare an earlier interest in that I was the judge who tried nearly all the permanent vegetative state cases for the withdrawal of hydration and nutrition. I never had the case of M, although I very nearly did. In fact, the patient, who was on the verge of being in a permanent vegetative state, died. It is an extremely rare case where it is uncertain whether somebody is in a permanent vegetative state or has minimal consciousness. At the moment, the only decision has been against withdrawing nutrition and hydration. This situation will arise from time to time. It will be very rare. It is intensely distressing for the family and intensely difficult for the doctors and nurses who care for these people who may, or may not, have minimal consciousness. It raises an incredibly important problem as to the point at which the doctors are ordered by the court to withdraw the artificial nutrition and hydration. It is perhaps the most difficult of all decisions that might come before a court. In cases of permanent vegetative state it is nearly always the hospital that brings proceedings, but if a family brings proceedings, or wishes to be part of the proceedings brought by a hospital, it would be very difficult for the family to put forward a case of this extreme difficulty if it had no access to legal aid, particularly with the medical evidence that would be required.

Again, as I said on the previous amendment, this is not going to cost very much money because it is not going to happen very often, but it is a particularly important fallback position. These are terrible cases to try, as I know to my cost.

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, on raising this matter and moving an amendment that could greatly assist a family, or others, in the context of the tragic and ethically challenging circumstances that he has so clearly outlined and which the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, has also addressed.

There is another set of circumstances in which the noble Lord’s amendment might well be applicable. While entirely endorsing his amendment on the grounds that he has advanced, I would like to refer to the suggestion of Mind in relation to the occasional need for people in detention under the Mental Health Act to also receive legal advice concerning treatment that may be prescribed for them. The system allows for legal aid to challenge the detention of someone who is being treated in a mental health facility but not in relation to treatment that might be proffered, or indeed insisted upon, by those in whose charge a patient might find himself.

Mind has provided helpful advice to people in detention who are unable to give consent for treatment. I will quote briefly from the document it has produced which is available to those in that position. The document outlines a whole series of things, including the definitions of various matters and persons, and then it asks:

“Can I be treated without giving consent to the treatment?”.

It goes on to say that,

“if … you have the mental capacity … you are generally entitled to refuse it and no undue pressure should be placed on you. However, the law does allow treatment to be given to an adult without consent where the adult lacks the mental capacity needed to give consent and where certain sections of the Mental Health Act apply. If you are experiencing mental distress and are offered treatment, you need to be aware of any legal powers that could be used if you refuse. However, the powers must not be used as threats to coerce you into consenting, and if you feel this is happening”—

this is the crucial point—

“seek independent legal advice and consider making a complaint”.

It suggests discussing concerns with a general practitioner and so on, and goes on to say:

“If you are under 18, the law is complex and it is best to seek specialist legal advice. It may be that you can consent on your own behalf, but this does not necessarily mean you have the same right to refuse. Others, such as your parents, guardian … may be able to consent on your behalf”.

Although the circumstances are very different and, I hope, of a less tragic character than those that have motivated the tabling of this amendment, there is a similarity in the situation of the clear need for legal advice to be available to people being detained under the Mental Health Act with regard to the treatment envisaged for them by those in whose care they find themselves. I would hope that the Minister will accede to the argument advanced hitherto by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas. In that event, the amendment would also cover the circumstances that I have outlined and which Mind has helpfully suggested.

Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Tuesday 10th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

I am an honorary member of Resolution. I would like the Committee to know that Resolution has extremely high standards in ensuring, if possible, that its clients settle every case which the lawyers deal with. It has a very impressive protocol on how each member of Resolution should behave in family law cases. I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, about the importance of collaborative law. As I understand it, it is the brainchild of Resolution, and Resolution is doing it with a view not to making a lot of money from it but to doing something to help families who otherwise will come before the courts. It is an admirable scheme run by an admirable organisation.

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, I was unaware of collaborative law until I read the briefing from Resolution, but I congratulate the organisation and the noble Lord on bringing these amendments to the Committee today. In the run-up to the Bill, the Government laid great emphasis on the need to find alternative methods of resolving disputes, and particularly on mediation. Mediation can undoubtedly play a role but it is not a straightforward matter. As I said on Second Reading, particularly where there is no equilibrium between the parties—or, to use the other phrase which has been bandied around your Lordships' House for some time, no equality of arms between the parties—mediation is not particularly suitable.

Certainly, those of us who have practised family law have often found in these cases that one party or the other—usually the husband—plays a dominant role in the relationship, particularly when it comes to litigation. All too often in my experience the other party—usually the wife—gives way. Mediation is not an adjudication and it is not a question of reaching an agreement between equals. Even if it were more balanced, it is interesting that the Government’s own projection was that out of 230,000 family cases only an additional 10,000 would be referred for mediation once the system changed as the Bill envisages. In any event, it was clearly not going to extend very much further than it does at the moment.

As the noble Lord has indicated, this proposal is of an entirely different character. In particular, there will be legal advice available—there will be somebody with the parties—and that should redress the balance that is so often missing in mediation and should lead to agreement. In fact, this was something that the previous Government had encouraged. Certainly there was the intention—I am not sure if it was realised—for legal aid to be made available for this on the basis of modest fixed fees being paid to the lawyers involved. As the noble Lord has pointed out, there was no incentive for those lawyers to prolong the case or see that it went further.

I understand from the briefing from Resolution that there has been some discussion—or at least correspondence—with the ministry, which seemed to warm to the idea and indicated that while it was recognised that Schedule 1 to the Bill only refers to family mediation,

“we think that should we wish in future to fund, for example, collaborative law, this could still be achieved. This might, for example, be through the issuing of guidance about what we wish to cover under the term ‘mediation’”.

It is not mediation, as Resolution itself points out, it is something distinct and different and, I suspect from the perspective of many of us, rather better and more useful than mediation.

The amendment deals only with family law. In principle, this process could be taken further—for example to things like employment or perhaps even debt cases, where a less elaborate process than the full litigation which is currently available but which will no longer be available to be supported by legal aid can give way to a process analogous to that which the noble Lord has outlined in the case of family law. There is great potential in this, and it is a better way of reducing the burden on the courts and the costs of public—or indeed private—funding than mediation in many cases.

I hope that the Minister will acknowledge that there is merit, both in the principle and in the amendment that the noble Lord has moved. Perhaps he will consider whether that same principle might be extended to other areas which it is the Government’s intention to remove from scope—not all areas, obviously, but there may well be some—even if it is not possible to identify those at the moment because there would have to be further consultation, and to perhaps bring back an amendment that would allow for additions to what might be brought within the framework of collaborative law, in the same way as subsequent amendments will allow for the addition as opposed to the deletion of items from scope. In that way, we would have a more flexible system that was able to adapt to changing circumstances and a changing ethos within the legal profession and advice services, and build on what appears to be a very successful initiative.

I hope that the Government will agree to take this back and look at it in principle from a supportive standpoint, and that we can end up with something very much along the lines of the noble Lord’s amendment, possibly with the additional factors to which I have referred.